President′s Message: Student Learning

By By President William E. Troutt

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Rhodes alumna Tan Hille ’69 recently commented about the strategic imperatives that accompany the Rhodes Vision: “Each of them is so integral to the Rhodes experience, if you take away any one of them, the others fall apart,” she said.

This is a compelling image, and one that will stay with me. Access, engagement and inspiration represent the key elements that lead students to their individual pursuits, and learning is the desired outcome. What better testimonial to student learning than the selection of our own Michael Lamb as a Rhodes Scholar? The entire community is so proud of Michael. For more about this deserving young man, see the article.

Another story that illustrates student learning features three outstanding alumni who have made their mark. They explain how their Rhodes education contributed to their remarkable success stories. All are convinced that their liberal arts education is at least as valuable to them as anything they learned in “B-School.” And for those of you who have wondered about the place of economics and business in a liberal arts college, I hope The Liberal Arts and Business will answer your questions.

Carole and I recently hosted a group of retired faculty and staff members for lunch on campus and told them, “You have certainly made my job easier. All of my conversations with our graduates begin and end with stories about their life-changing experiences with faculty members.” The article “Mapping the Future” illustrates why these outstanding men and women have such an impact on their students. This article tells the story a group of faculty members from different departments who identified a common need and set out to fill it. In doing so, they have created a new capability at Rhodes. Recent alums say the GIS expertise they learned in the laboratory helped prepare them for a variety of job requirements.

It is the intent of the Student Learning imperative to supply the resources to our faculty and staff that will enable them to provide even more of those personalized learning experiences that you cherish from your time at Rhodes. We hope it will resonate with you.